Ghastly Mistake, page 22
“Which you never should have! You did that without consulting me, so I have done this without consulting you.”
I couldn’t make out what he was thinking. Had I overplayed my hand?
“So you will leave Alenbonné?”
“We can keep a townhouse here for visiting.”
“Elinor.” He sounded exasperated.
“I don’t care about titles or estates — I did it for you! You left yourself too vulnerable to these people,” I cried, holding him tighter, for he had not embraced me back. “Even after your sacrifice, he wouldn’t leave you alone. He started these rumors, trying to hurt you again. Now I’ve turned the game back on him. He cannot act against you ever again.”
Unlike Valentina he immediately understood me. The gifting of Lindergaard would be an unofficial acknowledgment of the king and I having had an affair. Rules of society meant that he could never move against my husband. It just wasn’t done.
“But your reputation?”
“He’s already dragged it through the mud. Sadly, once he started the gossip, there was no way to stop it. At least this way, I paid him back for it.”
His arms came up around me. “What you need is a thorough spanking.”
“But you missed me, didn’t you? Missed me and all my chaos?”
“You are a devil, madame. An absolute devil.”
Epilogue
Lindengaard
Five months later
When I went into labor, I still had far too much to do.
“I’ve been told about this nesting instinct pregnant women feel, but aren’t you taking this a bit too far?” asked Charlotte.
We were in the library at Lindengaard, and I was dusting books in between labor pains. Charlotte was sitting in one of the wing-backed leather chairs near the fire. Dressed in her usual trousers, she wore her shirtsleeves rolled up, and her vest unbuttoned. She was sipping a glass of wine from our cellars, and reading a book between checking the watch sitting on her thigh.
“The cleaning would go faster if you helped,” I suggested.
Charlotte waved her hand. “No. No, thank you,” she said. “Housekeeping? Not what I do. When this baby is ready, I will be too.”
Even as my friend finished her sentence, a contraction started.
“Breathe, Elinor. It doesn’t do to hold your breath.” I forced myself not to grit my teeth against the pain. “Are you sure you don’t want me to call for Tristan?”
“You told me it could take hours before we are getting close. I have no need for him to hold my hand while we wait.” I took down a few books and started wiping their covers with my cleaning cloth.
“I really think you’re taking this idea of keeping your independence too far,” said Charlotte.
“You told me that most women don’t have their husbands there for the birth,” I reminded her.
“Tristan said he wanted to be here.”
“Well, he is here! Dealing with the plumbing!”
Charlotte couldn’t help but laugh. “If you had told me a year ago I’d see him with a wrench in his hand trying to fix a leaky pipe, I would have laughed.”
“It’s not my fault that Lindengaard is falling apart! Next time, I’ll suggest the king give me an estate that is in better repair.”
But I wouldn’t. I’d fallen in love with Lindengaard the moment I stepped out of the carriage and saw it. It was perfection — despite crumbling plaster, leaky pipes, and bats in the attic.
Oh. Another contraction hit me, and I stopped talking.
Charlotte was by my side in a flash, taking my pulse and looking at her pocket watch. “I’m fine, I tell you.”
“Your contractions are coming closer together. It’s time to quit this house-cleaning, and let’s—”
“What’s happening?” The love of my life entered, sleeves rolled up, and his shirt wet, with a pipe wrench in his hand. If I wasn’t in the middle of a contraction, I would have admired the delectable masculine picture he made.
“She needs to get to bed,” was Charlotte’s firm response.
Before I could reason with her, Tristan set aside the wrench and came over to pick me up.
“Tristan!”
“Elinor!” he returned, mockingly. He started up the stairs, me in his arms, and Charlotte behind him, carrying her medical bag.
“I’m the countess of Lindengaard. You can’t be picking me up without my permission.”
“You can dismiss me, milady, if I’ve overstepped my bounds, but considering how difficult it’s been to get a plumber to come out here, you might consider that carefully.”
A youthful voice floated up from downstairs. “Is it happening? Is the baby here? What name did you decide? I think Eduard is nice. Or maybe Jolene, if it’s a girl.”
We all shouted to Twyla at once.
“Tell Anne-Marie we need that boiling water up here,” Charlotte instructed.
“Would you grab that book down on the table I was reading?” I told her.
“Leave the book, and get the water and towels,” ordered Tristan.
By the time we were at our bedroom door, I was hit by two other contractions.
“They seem— more intense,” I told Charlotte.
“It’s your body getting itself ready. Perfectly normal. Right now, lie back and let me check on how things are progressing.”
Tristan made a mountain of pillows. He sat beside me, holding my hand. I clenched his rather tightly as Charlotte ‘checked things.’
It might seem strange that I had asked Charlotte to attend me instead of a midwife, but I had utter faith in her. Especially as she had told me she knew all the ways a woman could die from childbirth; corpses of pregnant women were highly sought after by the University’s medical college.
Morbid. Don’t think of that now.
Suddenly, the room filled with people. Cook brought up a pot full of steaming water. Anne-Marie was quick to warn her. “No! Don’t put that on that wooden table. It will scorch the wood!”
Melody, the servant I had met so long ago at Lindengaard, laid a thick towel down on the tabletop, and Cook plopped the pot down on top. I breathed a sigh of relief. Anne-Marie was right. We didn’t have enough good furniture to be scorching it!
Twyla entered, eating an apple. She announced to the room at large, “Madame Vogel from the Morpheus Society is here. She wants Elinor’s advice on—”
“Later!” growled my husband.
I sent out a whooshing breath, forcing myself to stop gulping air unless I wanted to hyperventilate.
“What about the bricklayer? He’s here too,” said Twyla. “They want a deposit up front, or they won’t start work. They say the old lord still owes them for the jobs they did during the Winter Revels.”
But I wasn’t paying attention to my apprentice or thinking about another bill. All of my attention was going inward, to the new life wanting out of me. From below my knees, Charlotte called out encouragement. “You’re doing well, Elinor. Don’t brace, just let it happen. Like a wave coming over you.”
Cook chatted with Melody, the Lindengaard’s maid, as if my room was her kitchen. “All my years with the old lord, and I never expected to see a new babe in this house.”
“The place is coming alive again,” agreed Melody. Upon my return, the servant girl had adopted a proprietary air over me.
Anne-Marie gave her contribution. “Madame will have the most beautiful baby in the world.”
I finally realized that it wasn’t pain blurring my vision. Apparitions appeared; the ghosts of Lindengaard were gathering to see the new heir born. Women and men. Children and teenagers. One among them I recognized: Count Christoffer Westergaard, the previous owner. Thankfully, he looked only confused, not accusatory, at my appropriation of his family estate.
“Aohhhh!” I cried.
“What’s wrong?” Tristan asked Charlotte.
“Nothing, Your Grace!” Her eyes looked to heaven, as she muttered, “Lord, give me the peace of the morgue.”
“Thank you for coming, Charlotte. I appreciate it,” I told her between gritted teeth, before crying out again, a bit louder. “Argh!”
“The baby is crowning,” said Charlotte. Like I didn’t know I was birthing a cannonball!
The ghosts grew closer, forming a ring around the bed. Twyla started to introduce them all. “That’s Lord Belshaw — he drowned. His brother held him under the water to inherit Lindengaard. The woman with the hair down to her waist is Lady Courbet. She drank lye after finding out her husband was having an affair with her best friend.”
“Twyla, not now!” said Tristan. His voice held a warning tone that would stop anyone else dead in their tracks, though it never dented Twyla’s enthusiasm to inform.
“I only thought Elinor would like to know who the ghosts were,” she said, hurt.
“Later, dear, later,” I huffed, panting.
One of the ghosts I knew very well. The Gray Lady of Hightower, Lady Eugénie Vaux Montaine. She looked at me mournfully. All the ghosts drew back, giving her precedence as she came closer to the bed.
I shook my finger at her, yelling, “Don’t you dare!”
“A momentous birth,” she intoned.
Charlotte cried out, exultant. “She’s here!”
“Yes, I know she’s here,” I snapped at my friend.
“I mean your child, Elinor,” said Charlotte, laughing. “A little girl!”
Anne-Marie rushed forward, handing the doctor towels to wipe the baby clean.
“Another push, Elinor.”
“Why?”
“Just push.”
Exhausted, I did as she asked. My reward was that Charlotte handed me my child.
“Her face is all squish-squashed,” said Twyla.
“She’s perfect,” said Tristan, his face close to mine as we gazed down upon our little miracle together, our hearts beating as one.
“We won’t be able to use our father’s names like we planned.” His arm came around me as he kissed my temple. “Perhaps that’s for the best, my dear. Let go of the past and have a fresh start.”
Lady Montaine, the Gray Lady, said once more in her solemn tones, “A momentous birth.” When she faded away, I was thankful to see the last of her wispy drapery.
“She’s so small,” Tristan said. His voice was reverent, as our daughter’s fists waved about.
Was he crying? Another drop plopped on my forehead, and I looked up.
“Tristan,” I said warningly. He followed my gaze. “Did you remember to shut the water off in the bathroom upstairs?”
“Oh, dear,” he said, before springing up to cast his body over me and our new baby to shield us from the falling plaster.
Want to meet another strong female character?
WHEN VIC ROWAN GOES HOME, she must navigate a storm of murder and magic. START READING A SPELL OF ROWANS NOW…
2021 Foreword INDIES Gold Winner in Fantasy
A Spell of Rowans Sneak Peek
MEET VIC ROWAN, a woman with a talent for trouble and a family with a reputation. START READING A SPELL OF ROWANS NOW…
As children Mother twisted our magic as part of her games.
My talent for reading other people’s feelings, my sister who could charm men, and my brother who knows with a touch the history of any object
But Troubles and Magic comes in Threes.
But when I returned to Grimsby to settle the estate, the police hauled in my autistic brother for questioning. And my sister knows what Mother was really doing at her antiques shop, Rosemary Thyme. Hint: Nothing good.
And that hometown boy I dumped way back after high school? He's in Grimsby and thinks he knows the truth about me.
2021 Foreword INDIES Gold Winner in Fantasy
Gold Winner, Literary Titan
Silver Winner, Readers Favorite
“- as Vic gets closer to her mother’s killer, using her power becomes a double-edged sword: the whirlwind of truths and lies threatens to entrap and drown her, even as her special abilities help her get to the bottom of the various unsolved mysteries.” - 5 stars, Clarion review
“A Spell of Rowans is an entertaining, moving story that readers of family sagas, sibling dynamics, and fantasy set in our contemporary world will enjoy.” - Booklife
NOTE Trigger warnings for discussion of child abuse and trauma, with an assault scene, suicide, and some cursing.
Taking the train was a calculated risk. I chose a time when it would be crowded with people all rushing to get home from work, their tired minds on getting dinner and not much else.
The larger the crowd, the more muddled the emotional output. My empath abilities registered it as white noise.
I watched the scenery flying by. The train was already out of the city, passing through the suburbs. It was all achingly familiar, and the dead link between me and my mother gave me an eerie feeling. Like I had forgotten something.
But I hadn’t. That was the problem. I hadn’t forgotten a damn thing.
At each stop, more passengers left to enjoy their ordinary lives. This line would eventually take me to Grimsby. It was the last stop before the train returned.
Tired from my interrupted sleep last night, I found my head starting to nod. My forehead pressed against the cool glass of the window, and to the rocking of the train, I fell asleep.
In the water, I was drowning. My hands flailed upward, trying to connect with something, anything. A hand pushed my head under the surface. I opened my mouth to scream. Stinking lake water entered my mouth, suffocating me.
I awoke with a start, choking, my heart pounding from fright. Still panicked, a voice made me jerk in surprise like a frightened deer.
“Pleasant dream, Vic?”
The carriage was now empty except for a man sitting opposite me, nearest to the aisle. A face I had known once as softer, more lively. Now his features held the neutral stillness of the experienced hunter. It assessed me with stony eyes.
My talent hit a blank emotional wall. I knew only one person that could do that: Reed Easton.
Like I didn’t have enough ghosts from the past. Some of what I felt must have shown on my face, for he said with a voice deeper than I remembered, “Not pleased to see me, old friend?”
“Good evening, Reed.”
He gave a gracious nod of his head, as if he were royalty, acknowledging a peasant. I wondered how long Reed had sat there watching me sleep. Was his interest creepy or romantic? Knowing how we had parted fifteen years ago, my guess veered towards unsettling. And dangerous.
As if he had read my thoughts, he asked, “Returning to Grimsby after all these years?”
I might not be able to read his emotions, but I was experienced in matching feelings to faces and words. He still held a grudge, while I had no regrets over burning that bridge. I was a talented bridge-burner, and had learned long ago: never look back to see the fire.
Suddenly, I became aware of how wrinkled my shirt was. Wearing the most paint-stained but comfortable jeans from my closet did not exactly scream: ‘look at how successful I am without you in my life.’
I pulled the sympathy card. “My mother died.”
“Ding dong, huh?”
Considering my mother’s reputation in Grimsby, I had already figured the turnout for any memorial service wouldn’t be numerous. But Reed’s words made me wonder. Maybe a crowd of Grimsby residents, all holding pitchforks, would storm the house, wanting confirmation that the witch was dead. As well as her spawn.
“Your sister seems to be doing well.”
“Yes, she is.”
How much longer before we pulled into Grimsby station? Could I excuse myself and hide in the bathroom?
“And Liam?”
I tried not to wince. Liam was not faring well. He had his reasons, but I wasn’t sharing them. I said politely, “He’s fine.”
Reed gave a small chuckle that I remembered all too well. “Still hiding the truth, Vic?”
I saw the silhouette of the town’s water tower against the setting sun. Good, not much longer. I reminded myself to act like an ordinary human being. I was experienced with pretending.
Keeping my voice level, I asked pleasantly, “Your family?”
“Fine,” he said, giving a smile that was sarcastic, acknowledging the game we played.
The adult version of his face had no softness, only angles. Reed, once a star athlete on the high-school swim team, was still lean and muscular. He wore crisp jeans, sharply pressed, a light blue jacket, and an Oxford shirt with the top button undone. It all fitted with immaculate tailoring. Well. Hm.
The train stopped. I practically jumped from my seat, grabbing my bag. Slinging the strap over my shoulder, and my eyes downcast, I muttered, “It was nice seeing you after all this time—”
With the speed of a cat, Reed was at the door, blocking my exit with his arm. He bent to me, his breath on my ear softly fluttering my hair. I shivered.
“Was it nice? Seeing me?” he asked softly.
I kept my eyes forward, looking straight through the glass to the platform beyond. Freedom was so close. When I didn’t answer, he pulled back, his light jacket flaring open with the movement.
I shoved the door open as fast as possible. As I hurried away, I wondered why my old high-school boyfriend would be wearing a gun.
WHEN VIC ROWAN GOES HOME, she must navigate a storm of murder and magic. START READING A SPELL OF ROWANS NOW…
2021 Foreword INDIES Gold Winner in Fantasy
Author Notes
NOTE: This fantasy world is inspired by 1910 France, but is not a part of it.
For convenience sake, American spellings have been chosen for this fantasy series. For example, instead of grey, gray is used.
